


Let the Light In

by sunflowerprince



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Depression, Domestic Fluff, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, Isolation, Love Confessions, M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, in which everyone is a mess that's it that's the podcast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:27:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24817600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerprince/pseuds/sunflowerprince
Summary: Jon brings Martin home, but the Lonely left teeth marks. And Martin is pulling at the stitches.Jonathan is a different kind of wreck every day of his life, and love is just more fuel to the trash fire of his existence.But maybe they can make it work in between all the things trying to kill them.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 5
Kudos: 59





	Let the Light In

**Author's Note:**

> Hi hello friends!
> 
> This is the first fic I've written in fourscore and seven years, and my first fic in this fandom. And what better way to break the ice than unleashing the Big Feelings these Absolute Nerds instill in my tiny, gay heart.

_“Tell me what you see.”_

_“I see—I see you, Jon.”_

Jon had caught Martin in his arms. His body had been shaking uncontrollably, and he ended up shouldering much of the other man’s weight as they crossed the beach that was not a beach at all. Jon could taste iron, could feel the rime of sea salt burn his chafed lips. 

“I’m sorry that you have to carry me.” Martin had said in a small voice. He hated hearing the warmth drawn out of it, the vibrancy—but that had been gone long before the Lonely had swallowed him whole. And Jon was to blame for it. He grimaced. “I just, it feels weirder to have a body now than it did when I didn’t have one.”

“You’ve nothing to be sorry for, Martin.” He had replied. The idea that Martin--bright, kind, Martin--would ever apologize to Him of all people gutted him. 

Jon had followed the call of his rib home, back to the Archives, where blood and glass and shredded paperwork riddled the hallways like a garden of carnage. Miraculously, terribly, he saw no bodies as he hurried Martin out of the damned building and onward to his flat.

Martin had fallen silent well before they arrived, and Jon worried that now that the adrenaline had worn off, he was feeling the full force of whatever had broken inside of him. His hands shook as he fiddled with the brass doorknob, and he shouldered the door so Martin could shuffle in ahead of him.

Martin stopped just inside, curled in on himself as he viewed Jon’s home. Or what had been Jon’s home. He’d taken to spending more hours at the Archives, sleeping on the couch in his office if he slept at all. Wandering streets and dreams, needing to sate his damned hunger. He could feel the weight of all the exertion of being in the Lonely, the sick power he’d used to pull Lukas’s statement out of him like holding open his ribcage centimeter by centimeter and extracting his heart. 

“Martin..” 

The man spooked at his name, his whole body shivering as he turned with wide eyes.

“Yes, Jon?”

The uncertainty in the younger man’s eyes made him ache, the raw nerves he could hear in his voice. Jon swallowed thickly, composing himself so he did not flinch. He could See the Lonely clinging to him, the ghost of fog just behind his eyes, the fine streaks of grey that caught the light against his dark curls, air around him heavy . There was a sharpness to him that hadn’t been there before. 

“Would you like some—can I make you some tea?”

“Yes, please.” His voice sounded distant, and Jon could swear he saw a tendril of fog swirl at the edges of his gaze as he turned to once more look around the space blankly. 

“Come sit.” Jon encouraged, and Martin drifted toward the well-broken in sofa.

Jon hurried to make the tea with a kind of frenetic energy. He felt his blood pulsing in his temple, and he hadn’t thought much of his heart in ages but he was certain it was attempting to escape his chest and take no prisoners. It was the helplessness of it all. No sign of Elias was not as good of an omen as he wanted it to be. He’d gotten what he’d wanted, whatever that was, whatever it meant that he’d won the bet with Peter and got to keep him. He should be more indignant about being a pawn in some eldritch chess game, but, well, that wasn’t new and he was worried about if Daisy was still Daisy and if Basira had escaped and if Not-Sasha was finally exterminated and god, the Silence, the silence of Martin. He let out a curse as he burned his fingertips on the kettle and knocked the sugar over.

As soon as he had steeped the tea--in a cracked mug with strawberries on it, a mug Georgie had given him, that he thought Martin would like—he realized he didn’t actually know how Martin took his tea. All of the times Martin had prepared tea for him and he’d rebuffed him, and then all the times he had accepted it and it was Perfect and he knew, he knew he’d never told Martin how he liked it, all of those memories were like punches to the gut. They were all reminders that he was, in fact, a bit of a monster before the Eye even had a real go at him. 

“Martin?” His voice was thick with strain.

“Yes, Jon?” He said in that far-off voice that paraded spiders down his spine.

“I’m ashamed to realize that I don’t know how you would like your tea.”

“Strong, with just a bit of honey. And don’t feel bad, Jon, there’s no reason for you to know that.” 

Jon would have assumed someone soft and sweet like Martin would want sugar and cream, which was just more evidence of how thoroughly he had not understood Martin. How he hadn’t even tried, really.

“Here you go.” He didn’t let go of the steaming mug until Martin had it firmly in his hands. 

“Look, Jon.” He said, a little dreamily. “I can do fingers again.”

“That’s very good, Martin.” Jon walked round the sofa to tug at the afghan thrown over its back. He leaned over to tuck the soft, forest green fabric around Martin, accidentally brushing his hand.

They both flinched back, Martin with a low hiss.

“S-sorry.” Jon said, looking at his hand as if it were a loaded weapon. Martin had been so cold to the touch. And it had been so long since he’d touched anyone where violence wasn’t involved. The last time he’d voluntarily touched someone, she had burnt his palm, the mess of scarring a too-poetic reminder of what happened when he got close to people. 

Martin pulled the blanket tighter round himself, sinking into the safety of its embrace.

Before the silence could settle heavily between them once more, Jon’s phone rang. He fumbled for it, surprised it was still intact in his pocket after interdimensional travel. He would definitely renew his contract with the company. 

“Basira?” Jon breathed.

“There you are! I’ve been trying to get ahold of you for ages. Where the bloody hell are you? Did you stop Elias? Did you find Martin?”

“I’m at my place. Yes, no, I don’t know! I’m with Martin. I had to go into the Lonely to find him. I stopped Peter, which helped Elias, so that can’t be anything good. You haven’t seen him? Where are you? Where’s Daisy?” If Basira was alive, he could hold onto the kernel of hope that Daisy had made it back from her sacrifice, that she was able to strip the Hunt away once more, once its part was done.

“I bailed as soon as the fighting finished. In transit. Daisy…she didn’t make it, Jon. Not as herself.” The usual sharp confidence in her tone was absent. 

“Oh god.”

“I’ll find her Jon.” It sounded less like a promise to him than a pact to herself. “For the time being, I’m checking each of her safe houses that I know of. And her, her hunting ground.” 

“Is there anything I can do?”

“I think the best thing you can do is stay far away from me.” She paused. “Shite, that sounded harsher than I meant it to. I think it’s safer for all of us to split up, until we have an idea of what Elias is up to. There’s a cabin in Scotland, one of Daisy’s, I’ll send the address. I nabbed some statements for you, so don’t go around being a spook eating peoples’ fears and sneaking around their nightmares. God.”

“What? And I don’t sneak.” 

“I’m sorry, do you prefer ‘skulk?’ And I just realized you literally are nightmare fuel. You eat nightmare fuel. Tell that to Martin, later, whichever is funniest. He’ll laugh.” 

Jon cast a sidelong glance at Martin, whose focus had wandered away from the conversation and was fixed on the middle distance. 

“Right.”

“Jon—”

“Yes, Basira?”

“I’m glad you both made it out.” Her usual brusque tone lost its edges as she dropped to a murmur. 

“Me, too.” Jon said. “About you and--and Daisy. I can’t ever thank you enough.”

“You’re right.” Basira agreed. Jon knew they were both thinking about the cost to Daisy. “But you’ll show up for us when we need you, too.”

The thing was, she sounded certain. When had he and Basira gone from being unlikely allies to tense teammates to—he stopped before he thought “friends.” Jonathan Sims did not have _friends_. Peter had been right, people died around him, they broke. 

“I’ll text you the details. Sounds like you and Martin should take a couple days. Look after him.”

Jon didn’t think he’d be able to take his eyes off him again.

“Bye Jon.”

“Good-bye Basira.”

He looked at the phone in his hand for a long moment before he turned to Martin, who was looking at him again.

“That was Basira.”

“I heard.”

“She says she’s glad you’re safe. And to tell you that I run off of…nightmare fuel.”

Martin blinked. “That’s a terrible joke.” 

“Yes.”

A smile so small he would have missed it if he wasn’t staring so intently at Martin blossomed at the corner of his mouth. 

“I’m sorry, Martin.”

The smile dissolved.

“What for?” He asked guardedly. 

Jon rubbed at his knuckles, worried his fingers against the thick scar tissue on his hand. 

“I didn’t see you before.”

Martin sucked in a little gasp, and his jaw worked as he tilted his head to one side.

“Martin.”

He refused to meet Jonathan’s eyes, and every particle of his being knew he deserved it. 

“Martin.” He said, impossibly soft, lowering himself to sit on the edge of the coffee table, a blasphemy he would only commit for this, for _him_. “I am so, deeply sorry. And I understand if it’s much too late. You were—you were always there, with a smile and your small gestures and even if you didn’t always know _how_ to help you always, always wanted to help.” He took a deep breath. “And I gave you nothing but scorn in return. I underestimated you, dismissed you.”

Martin still kept his gaze averted, a death grip on the blanket cocooning him. 

Jon picked at already bloodied nail beds, gathering the courage to go on. The thing was, at his core, he was not a brave man. He was a rash man, who sought and sought and sought no matter what it costed those around him, no matter what he lost in the pursuit. He did not spill pretty words from his mouth and even less, words that felt like lifeblood leaving his lips. He preferred to keep things tucked away, keep them out of sight. He wished to be unknown. It was safer that way, never allowing anyone to sink their teeth into the vulnerable parts of him. Unspooling his heart would be a tiny death.

But Martin was worth each agonizing syllable.

“The Lonely wanted me.” 

“What?”

“Really wanted me. When no one else did. It didn’t want me when I’m useful or convenient. It wanted all of me. Do you know what it’s like to be loved totally and unconditionally Jon? It was like an old friend, a best friend. I didn’t have to be worthy of their attention.” Tendrils of fog unfurled from his lips, twisting lazily downward. The room dropped several degrees. His hands began to shake, almost vibrating, as they slowly edged out of existence.

“Martin—”

“No, Jon, it’s my turn to talk. You talk over me and around me all the time.” His voice quavered, but it was with a rage Jon had never witnessed in him before. “Do you know how pathetic I felt? How pathetic I _was_? Lapping up each grain of approval because I could never hope for affection, no even I wasn’t that daft. I swallowed each barb, because underneath it all, I thought I saw a man who was hurt the most by his own thorns. And when you were gone—when you were really gone, I was desperate for even those cutting remarks, desperate for anything.” 

Martin was looking at him now, eyes alight with a wildfire in place of their usual comforting warmth. The heavy scent of rot and kelp lay between them. 

“You’re right. You’re absolutely right and I deserve this, I deserve every ounce of your resentment. You were always trying to be there for me, took care of me, and I—you were wasted on me, I’m afraid.”

The heat drained out of Martin’s expression, simmering down until everything was drained, until he looked drawn and adrift.

“Earlier, in the Lonely, you said—did you mean what you said? About—about me. How you felt.”

Martin turned his dead gaze back to meet him in the eye.

“Yes, Jon. I did.” He said it dispassionately, colorlessly, and Jon would have given anything, everything, to wrest him away from the fog, the fog that was telling him false things and true things that were equally terrible.

“I want you to know—and it’s not enough, I know it’s not enough. But I want you to know, unequivocally, before whatever new hell will be chasing us tomorrow—I feel the same.”

A soft spark lit up Martin’s face, wary, but there. 

“What are you saying Jon?”

“I’m saying—” The words wanted to crawl back down his throat, everything in him was screaming that this was the Knowledge that would undo him, that nothing could come of it but wreckage. But looking at the man before him, who had sacrificed everything he was to protect him, who found something good under all the grime that was Jonathan Sims, this man with the messy curls and the soft body and softer heart, his heart, God, how did he bear for it to be so exposed?

“I’m saying I love you, Martin Blackwood.”

It felt so miraculous, so much lighter and righter than he had any right to expect.

“I love you, Martin. I see you.”

The fog dissipated, retreating slowly back into Martin’s skin. His face was still shuttered with disbelief, but there were tears gathering in his red-rimmed eyes.   
“I don’t expect anything of you, Martin. You have given me so much already, too much. I just—I wanted you to know, is all.” Jon let the silence stretch between them a moment before grabbing Martin’s now-empty mug and placing it in the sink with a metallic clink.

“Now.” He began, donning his Archivist armor once more. “Your clothes are stiff with salt. You need clean clothes and a shower. You can borrow some of mine until we have time to pick up your things from your flat.” 

Martin looked on in puzzlement. 

“You’re staying the night.” His tone brooked no argument. He never quite knew what to do with himself, but he was quite good at telling others what to do.   
Martin allowed himself to be herded into the bathroom, and Jon showed him which knob to pull to get hot water. He left a spare toothbrush on the counter. He always kept a year’s worth of toothbrushes on hand. He liked to be prepared. He scrounged around and left a neatly folded pile of clothing beside a fresh towel and briskly walked out of the bathroom before Martin could say a word. It was only a couple minutes before the water began to run. Satisfied, Jon went about preparing sleeping space. He would take the couch, of course, and Martin could take the bedroom. He dressed the bed in fresh sheets and went to leave, turned around, and fluffed each pillow before leaving the room and settling on the couch to read.

“What are you doing?”

Jon startled. He had been deep into a dense philosophy book in one hand, and a noir thriller in the other.

“Reading.” He said, deadpan.

“Two books at once?” 

“Well, if I had more hands, I’d read more. I go through them so quickly I positively con—” His brow furrowed.

“Consume them?” Martin said dryly, eyebrow raised.

“It gets to be quite an expensive diet.” Jon replied equally dryly. 

“So, I’m, uh, ready to go to sleep.” 

Jon was very acutely aware, then, of Martin dressed in his old sweatpants, which he filled out beautifully. He tried and failed to suppress a smile at the way the difference in their heights made the pants more like cut-offs on Martin.

“What are you looking at?” Martin asked self-consciously, turning inward on himself.

“Nothing.” He tilted his head away, cheeks warming his normally corpselike visage. He desperately hoped it was too dim to see.

“You’ll be taking the bed.” Jonathan raised a hand against the self-sacrificing protests already spilling out of Martin. “One of us lost their corporeal form today and it wasn’t me. You get the bed.”

“ _Fine_.” He began storming off back toward the bedroom, then stopped. “Thank you. For saving me. I miss it—I miss the Lonely and I know I shouldn’t. I couldn’t have left without you. Good night, Jon.”

The words spilled out of him so quickly Jon didn’t have time to reply.

He settled back into the sofa, afghan loosely sprawled across his lap.

Today had been the hardest, best, worst day of his life. Martin was alive, but lost all the same. Peter was gone, but he took answers with him. Daisy was alive, but she gave up everything she’d worked so hard for, every scrap of herself, to protect him. Basira was out chasing whatever had become of Daisy. And Elias had won.

Elias had won.

Jon sank back, resting his head on the back of the sofa. He would think of all the consequences later. Ironic that he didn’t Know anything when he actually wanted and needed it.

He tried to sleep for hours, god knows he needed it, with the dark circles under his eyes getting ever darker. And he was so hungry. He futilely rummaged around and picked at some fruit and crackers, knowing they could not fill the void in his stomach, the one that craved fear, that would only be sated by a stranger’s trauma. He sighed, heavily, resigning himself to watching a marathon of documentaries about deep sea creatures. He would have to hold on until he could meet up with Basira. He wouldn’t leave Martin unprotected and if he was being honest with himself, something he wholeheartedly strived not to do usually, he wanted to tuck away all the monster bits of him where Martin couldn’t see. Where he wouldn’t be reminded of how misplaced his love had been.

And, oh, if that wasn’t another pain he wasn’t expecting, he who thought he knew everything and knew better, at that. Butchered a love he didn’t even realize he’d had.

“Could really use one of those right now. Just swallow me whole.” He muttered when a Megalodon swam across the screen, a great behemoth of crushing teeth and the promise of being dragged ever into the deep. 

He got up and tip toed to his bedroom, opening the door as quietly as possible. After it all, he just needed to see Martin there, safe. He couldn’t see anything in the slanting light from the window. He stepped softly into the room, Basira’s voice echoing in his head, calling him a spook. 

“Martin?” He whispered. 

He reached the edge of the bed. No one was in it.

“Martin?” He repeated, panic creeping into his voice. He patted down the bed, hands frenzied.

How had he not noticed Martin leaving? He was too weak to be on his own right now, all wrapped up in the Lonely, with god knows how many avatars waiting in the night for easy prey. He cursed himself for his carelessness. He’d had him back, had a second chance at protecting Martin, and he failed so miserably so quickly.

“Martin!” He rushed back into the living area, heart in his throat.

“I’m here, Jon.”

He spun around in a wild arc, hand pressed against his furiously beating chest.

“Martin? Where are you?”

Martin appeared out of thin air, huddled in the armchair by the sofa.

“Chrissake! What are you doing running around all invisible-like!”

“I couldn’t sleep, but I didn’t want to talk to you. I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn’t think you’d check on me.”

Jon just stared, jaw working.

Martin just tucked into himself further, bare feet cresting the edge of the cushion.

“When I close my eyes, I’m in a room.” Martin said. “It’s pitch black, and there are no walls nor floor to be felt, but I know it’s a room. And I am not alone. I can feel the presence of someone in the dark with me, the weight of their gaze on me. They aren’t breathing. They’re watching. All they are is watching. And I can’t sleep, because I want to be alone, totally and completely, but there are no walls and there is no floor and there is no _door_ and I’m trapped in togetherness.” 

“Oh, Martin.” Jon exhaled. 

“I know I shouldn’t want it, shouldn’t want to be so utterly alone. But it was gentle there, Jon. It was my truth and it hurt but it hurt in a way that was acceptance, not agony.”

Jon wandered closer, approaching the man he loved too late like he might bolt at any sudden movement. He knelt next to him, slowly extending his hand so that his long fingers rested delicately right next to Martin’s foot. He gazed steadily until Martin matched his stare. And then he extended his ravaged hand, slowly, slowly, an offering. 

Martin clenched and unclenched his rigid fingers from around his ankle. 

Jon worked his fingertips under Martin’s, coaxing them until they loosened and their hands rested together. They buzzed lightly, Martin’s fading fingers humming against Jon’s solid hand.

“You have a right to feel however you feel, Martin. You’ve been through so much, too much. But I won’t sit by and let that cold, hungry darkness tell you that you are its.”

“But I belong there.” Martin whispered. “It’s the only place I’ve ever belonged.”

Jon tsked. He moving his hand upward, cusping Martin’s chin in an open, gentle gesture.

“You have new places to be.” 

Jon moved away, then, not wanting to move a centimeter further but not willing to test Martin’s boundaries. He got up, crossing to the rummage drawer in the kitchen. He dug through the debris of batteries and receipts for a small package, wrapped simply in brown parcel paper. He walked across the room and held it out gingerly until Martin took it in his hands. 

“What’s this?”

“Open it and find out.” 

Martin picked at the paper, tearing it until a strip of denser paper shone through the gap. He continued worrying at it, precise and gentle. Eventually he unearthed the paperback with its rough-edged pages and gold type on the cover.

“Oh.” Martin exhaled in stemmed surprise. 

“I hope you—I hope you don’t have it already. Or if you do, I can return it. Or you can have a spare for travel. Or writing in the margins? Do you do that type of thing? I take notes in my books, but I know some people are precious about it. Anyways, I bought it for you awhile back—I kept trying to find a way to get it to you, but I saw you so rarely after I, ah, awoke, and I knew if I tried to get Peter to give it to you on my behalf, well, it would do me the same to put it in the bin myself.”   
Martin began trembling a bit and Jon sucked in a breath, terrified that he had found a way to make things worse. 

“It’s lovely, Jon.” Martin’s ghostlike fingers solidified. He looked up, thumbing the uneven pages. “No, I don’t have it. Thank you.”

“Oh. Well. Good. Yes. You’re quite welcome.” The air left Jon’s lungs in a rush, relieved. 

“I didn’t think you thought of me, when I was working with Peter. That I’d pushed you far enough, for your safety, and then my comfort…I was sure you’d give up on me sooner than later.” Martin clutched the volume of poetry close to his chest. 

“I could never forget you, Martin. I tried to catch you in passing so many times, thought if I could just talk to you without Peter around to interfere…I couldn’t even bear to drink tea that wasn’t made by you, Martin. I would make it in your mug in the breakroom and then just let it…sit, on my desk till it was cold.” Jon sighed, taking a seat on the sofa, as close as he could get to Martin without scaring him off. “I was miserable, Martin. I didn’t realize how empty the archives were without you in them.” 

Martin blushed furiously, which was the most heartening thing to happen since they had come back from the Lonely. 

“I had no idea, Jon. Peter just had this way of—of knowing when I was getting distracted, when I was thinking too much about you all, worrying too much. And then he would mention how odd it was, that no one made a real effort to come see me. And then I would remember how much I annoyed you with my bumbling and my, my everything and it made perfect sense. And then when I yelled at Daisy…it just starting feeling good to choose to be alone. Not having to wait for someone to abandon me.” Tears were tracking down his rosy cheeks at that point, disappearing into little wisps of fog that spiraled down.

“Oh, Martin.” Jon sighed. “Peter was an absolute arse.”

“I mean, yes, in summary.” Martin continued laughing through his tears, and Jon thought maybe, maybe, they could be okay, eventually. 

“Jon?”

“Yes, Martin?” He kept saying his name like an incantation, Martin, Martin, Martin. Maybe that would ground him. Remind him who he was and remind him to stay. 

“Could I—would you mind if I stayed out here with you?” He braced himself for rejection. 

“I would adore it.” 

They fell into a comfortable silence, Jon’s eyes fixed on the telly, where there was a special on spiders, ones with big fat bodies and spindly legs, ones that slept in the ground and waited for a feast of birds, ones with the furriest of bodies, like they were wearing fuzzy pyjamas. Martin flipped through his book, fingering the spine and pouring over each page like they contained tiny worlds. Maybe one day Jon could learn to see what Martin saw, the special insight not even the Ceaseless Watcher could give him.

By the time they fell asleep, their hands were suspended between the arm of the sofa and that of the armchair, their fingers a gradual twining in the night.

The next morning, Jon awoke to a strangled noise.

He immediately shot up, casting his gaze about blearily.

“Who’s there? Martin? Martin, what’s wrong?” 

Martin turned around, framed by the halo of light from the fridge, door swung wide open. 

“Jon!”

“What is it?” A rough edge found its way into his tone, born of nerves.

“How have you even survived on your own this long? There’s nothing in here but some jam and a half-eaten sandwich. And don’t tell me you’re eating because fuck _off_ , nightmares do not contain protein!” He moved on to the pantry and let out another scandalized gasp. “There is a single overturned box of Weetabix, a bag of crisps, and—is that—Jon is that a pack of fags? That’s not—that’s not a food group, Jon!”

“I eat. I eat plenty of things. Plenty of people food.” Jon groused.

Martin swung around, incredulous. “Are you telling me that Jonathan Sims, the mighty Archivist, the harbinger of the Eye, basically the clerk at the information desk of _Hell_ , doesn’t know how to grocery shop?”

“Now, Martin, let’s not get carried away.” 

“We’re going shopping. Immediately. Get dressed.”

All Jon could do was submit, albeit complaining the whole way. But really, he was heartachingly happy to have Martin boss him around. To have this one vibrant moment amidst the fog. And he would do whatever he had to do to keep him.

There was a moment, in the market, where Martin reached for a shelf Jon was too short for, where the warm light cast from the bulbs overhead allowed Jon to sappily imagine him silhouetted in a halo, there, arm extended for a particularly elusive can of soup, like a renaissance painting. 

“Martin.” He breathed, struck.

“Mm?” He glanced down, fingers curling around the tin can.

“Martin Blackwood, will you be my boyfriend?”

The tin can hit the floor with a horrible clamor as Martin yelped and scrambled for it.

“Jon.” He admonished. “You can’t just say things like that.”

“Is that a no, then?” He tried to suppress a grin, but the laugh had already given him away.

“You don’t have to…I know what you said last night, Jon, but I won’t hold you to that, you were—under duress, trying to steady me, it’s okay really, I know you could never want to be with a bloke like me—” As Martin began to ramble about his subpar qualifications on the matter, the whisper of an echo inlaid his voice and Jon wondered, fondly, achingly, if this is what Martin’s mind sounded like all the time.

Jon released a long-suffering sigh. He had to stretch a little to make the mark, but he held Martin’s face with his ruined hand. He pressed his lips delicately against his, a slow, burning kiss, a kiss with a quiet fire. He didn’t have use for sexual endeavors, but there were so many other ways he loved to be touched, to be held, to _hold_. And kissing, kissing was positively lovely, especially with the tiny noise Martin made.

“I’m actually quite looking forward to unsteadying you, once you’re well enough.” Jon pulled back, basking and not just a little smug with the completely undone way Martin looked, all soft and flustered.

“Jon…”

Jon took the soup from Martin and irreverently tossed it in their trolley, grasping his now freed hand. Martin looked at their hands twined, gulped audibly, and they continued walking down the aisle.

“Oh, we’re going to Scotland by the way.”

“What?” Martin squeaked.

“Basira is offering us one of Daisy’s safehouses, we can weather things out there until we can regroup.”

“Scotland.” Martin repeated. 

“Oh, we should probably go down the snack aisle, we’ll need treats for the ride.”

“Figure we’ll pack trail mix and cassette tapes, yeah?” Martin joked, still dazed. 

Jon cast him a sidelong glance, lips quirked.

“Well.” Martin said at last, holding Jon’s hand just a bit tighter. “I hear they have good cows there.”


End file.
